Bob Furst's List: Tennis

• A statement from Williams announcing her U.S. Open withdrawal cited only "the surgery I had on my foot earlier this month." When asked about her sister's injury, Venus Williams said, "Serena released as much information that she wanted to about her leg."
• When asked whether the cut was at the top or bottom of Williams' foot, Clijsters said, "Both feet."
• One reporter was told that a player who saw the injury said Williams' toe was almost cut off.

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• It's worth thinking about, now that Venus Williams has declared herself out of action for the rest of the year because of the lingering effects of a knee sprain she suffered in the summer -- an incapacity that has allowed her to play exactly one tournament in the past six months.
• Na Li played well to beat Williams in the quarterfinals of the Australian Open
• was issued a routine loss (6-4, 6-3) by Nadia Petrova in the fourth round of the French Open.
• But being a Williams, Venus still had a surprise in store. She had a terrific run at the U.S. Open, in which she lasted until the semis before losing to Kim Clijsters, 6-4, in the third.

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• Now here comes Thomas Muster, with gray stubble on his face at 43 and a wild card into the Vienna tournament this week after more than 11 years away from the ATP Tour.

• Dementieva won 22 main-tour titles (16 in singles) and over $14 million in prize money. She's 29 years old, which is not exactly young for a pro player, but she's a clean-living, hard-working, extremely-fit specimen whose greatest asset was a brand of athleticism unmatched by her WTA rivals.

• Wozniacki has won the most tournaments this year -- six -- but has yet to win a major tournament. She's 15-24 overall against top 10 players and hasn't beaten Clijsters, Justine Henin, Venus or Serena Williams

• Wozniacki showed she was game Sunday by fighting back with verve in the Doha final, turning a contest that had all the makings of a 59-minute yawner into a close match. (Clijster finally won, 6-3, 5-7, 6-3.) But the loss put her dilemma in a nutshell. Those three post-Wimbledon events in which Wozniacki did not hoist the trophy? Clijsters won every one of them. And they were the three most significant events of the summer and fall. It isn't Wozniacki's fault that the top players don't play more, but she would help her own cause if she accumulated a better record against them.

• For the second time in three seasons, the women's year-end No. 1 goes to a player who has never won a major. Caroline Wozniacki earned the, uh, distinction, duplicating Jelena Jankovic in 2008. Wozniacki reached only one Grand Slam semifinal in 2010.
• Williams, at 30, can't count on her body to heal the way it did 10 (or even four or five) years ago. Further, the last 30-plus women's player to win a major was Martina Navratilova at Wimbledon in 1990.

• In 38 previous Grand Slam singles draws, the furthest Schiavone had ever advanced was the quarterfinals -- in 2001 at Roland Garros, the 2003 U.S. Open and in 2009 at Wimbledon. But this year in Paris, something magical happened. After an indifferent clay-court run-up (she was a combined 3-3 in Stuttgart, Rome and Madrid), Schiavone found an equilibrium at the storied, ivy-covered venue and blasted through the field. She beat Caroline Wozniacki, Elena Dementieva and Samantha Stosur -- top 10 players all -- on the way to her first major title.
• Schiavo, as her family and friends call her,

• The defending champion for the men's single's tournament is Roger Federer, who will return to defend his title against the likes of Rafael Nadal, Novak Djokovic and Andy Murray. Serena Williams, the 2010 women's singles titleholder, had to withdraw from the tournament due to a foot injury, but the other top-five ranked women will participate, including No. 1 seed Caroline Wozniacki.
• The reigning men's singles champion is Roger Federer, and Serena Williams won the 2010 women's title. Bob and Mike Bryan and Serena and Venus Williams won the men's and women's doubles, respectively.

• The absence of two-time defending champion Serena Williams means the women's draw is more open than usual.
• The knees don't seem to be a problem for Nadal as he tries to emulate Rod Laver, the last man -- and only one in the Open era -- to capture four in succession, 41 years ago
• On the one hand, Kim Clijsters says this year might be her last full season. Then she says she could keep going for four more years.

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